Spring - A Very Wet, Possibly Flooding Season for Us

We're in Spring here in the Frozen Northlands, and that means unpredictable weather and warm temperatures dueling with snowstorms. We had a snow over Sunday/Monday that dumped 2-3 inches onto the ground, making our world white once more. But as I drove home from work last night, I noticed all of that snow had disappeared and we were once again at Spring's threshold. 

Yes, we're still able to get snow, and actually had a 
Saturday-Monday where we got 2-4 inches across 
the Cities. But it's really the end of the season, so by 
the time I was leaving work yesterday, it had all 
melted. 

The rivers are flowing high and flooding is happening along many of them. It was a very snowy winter - not the highest snowfall, but up there in the top three. That's impressive snowfall numbers, so our thaw is dramatic and, in some cases, dangerous. River levels are high and the speed is as well, I know there will be flooding in some areas. No doubt. 

This photo is from somewhere in Northern 
Minnesota. As you can tell, there's a lot of 
water our there coming down right now. 
It's beautiful, and it's dangerous. 

DH did manage to get the backyard cleaned up late last week, so we have a full yard waste bucket for Wednesday's pickup, and that part of the yard looks reasonable. The front yard needs some serious raking and cleanup. If we're done with the snow, we might be able to get to it by the weekend. 

As you can tell from this photo on the Big Fork, 
the waters are angry. They are roiling and 
carrying a lot of soil along with them downstream. 
Various towns already have their sandbags 
prepared and laid down, hoping to keep away 
any flooding. We'll see. The next two weeks 
will be crucial. 

He's also dreaming about what flowers to put into his garden this year. He knows he'll have minimal time to devote to it - our focus will be on getting the store closed and the merchandise sold or consigned. He'll be picking low-care items that will brighten our Sundays, because I think we'll still need to get a day off every week or two. It's going to be a high-stress year, for sure. 

Personally, I won't be affected by high water, but Chickie 
will have to use an alternative road to get to and from 
work since she crosses the Mississippi River every day 
to get to work and back home. The yellow dots 
stretching from the Twin Cities southeast follow the 
Mississippi River. The red dots to the northwest 
are on the Red River which actually flows north 
towards Canada. Sandbags have been placed and people 
are on water watch. 

So, have an excellent Tuesday. I'm wrapping this up and heading out to the pool. I think I need a good workout to get my own stress levels back under control. Slava Ukraini. 

Holding Back the Flood

It's raining. Normally that would be a wonderful thing. Rain instead of snow means Spring instead of Winter and that's an excellent thing. ... Isn't it? Well, normally the answer would be a resounding "yes" except when Winter's grip is still firmly in place. So we're getting rain - a lot of it - but the ground is still frozen and we've still got snowbanks everywhere, sometimes towering into the massive mountains of snow that you'll see in the major shopping center parking lots. Where does all of this rain go? 

Although this particular photo is from Cleveland, Ohio, their
parking lot snowpiles are pretty similar to what you'll find
here or anywhere else in the snow belt. Huge, high piles of
snow around the periphery of the parking lots. 

That's the problem. We don't hate rain, but when the rain has nowhere to go, we get flooding. Bad flooding. The low points in the freeways flood out, the low points in parking lots become temporary lakes, the roadways get lovely glare ice because the water sheets down them, and here, in our cozy home, I will get the job of checking the back door regularly throughout the day today to make sure we're not flooding through it. 

Do you remember this photo from 2016? Here, DH was in full
"build" mode, constructing the curved tiered walls that make
up the western part of our lower back yard. I'm standing just
about where my back door is located. 

The back door is where DH has been building the castle over the past few years,. The curved and terraced walls of flowers and other plants, the herringbone patio we had set two years ago, and the cleared bank for the eventual pergola we were fixing during buckets of rain last summer. The difficulty isn't the construction work, it's the fact that there's no real channel established for the run-off just yet, and right now the water level is almost up to the level of my basement door. If DH gets a chance, he'll try to clear away some of the ice on the patio and create a larger channel for the rainwater, but if he doesn't get the chance, I might be doing that myself in the pouring rain later this morning. 

A year or so after the construction above, we got the patio laid. It's
done with paver stone in a herringbone pattern. They did an OK
job - not the greatest, but OK. We used it often last year, though,
sitting on the patio and enjoying margaritas. 

Of course I also have the usual stuff for my "day off" - shopping (grocery and Target today will make it an expensive day), catching up on reading and writing my daily story for B2MeM, a nice chat with Aearwen this afternoon, and several loads of laundry. I also have to gather our paperwork for our Tuesday night income tax appointment with our accountant. Yeah - it looks like a busy day, even without the rain, glare ice, and ... yeah! 

So here's hoping your weather is a bit better than mine and that you have a wonderful Wednesday. It's a fact that I'm still planning to be back tomorrow, although I might be crabby from having my schedule totally disrupted by floodwaters coming into my den. Been there, done that, and really don't want to experience that again. 

Spinning Wheels

So the fans are still drying out my carpeting, but things are pretty dry. I should be able to start reassembling my closet tonight. The plumber is set for Thursday morning and, with the long list of things that have been piling up, I think he'll be here for most of the day. DH will take the day off from work to be here with him.

I want my carpeting to be as dry as this desert-like lake bed. Go fans, go!

Our road is under reconstruction, the city is doing something with the sewer and water systems, so getting to the house is getting more and more challenging. Hopefully the plumber won't have any problems getting to us. If we were another block or two west, it could be quite dicey.

Since my AinA story is complete and happily received by my assigned friend, and since I have also happily received my own, I can concentrate on my classwork which I have been letting fall through the cracks. Between the Olympics, my AinA and the plumbing issues, I've barely had a chance to read through the class notes at all. That's NOT good since there is some really good stuff that's being passed on to us from the teacher and I really need to get this stuff into my system and make them a part of my writing thoughts. Another thing that I need to do is to start to get familiar with my characters for my NaNo. I tried the questionnaire-style character development method and that didn't work well for me. So I think I'll try to interview each of the characters. I might be more successful that way. Well...nothing ventured, nothing gained, right? At least I was able to get back to the treadmill again today. Yippee! Another mile closer to Rivendell.

Water, Water Everywhere...

Water and issues with water follow us wherever we live. I've had to dig up pipes, I've had collapsing walls, I've had large waterfalls of water flowing through my basement windows, and I've had pipes broken inside of walls requiring serious repairs. Last night we had another water problem *sigh* and once again had to deal with clean-up.

It's not that I don't love water. This pool in Provence would be lovely. I just don't want a pool inside my house...

I sleep downstairs on the livingroom couch because it is nicer on my back than the matress in the bedroom. This also allows my DH to completely monopolize the bed, which he does with great pleasure. I awakened at about 11:30 pm and everything was fine. I awakened within 45 minutes after that to a strange sound and followed the noise. Turning on the hall light I saw a steady stream of water coming from the light down to the carpeting of the hallway below. I pounded up the steps towards my DH's bathroom, opened the door, turned on the light, and saw that his floor was covered by water. Shouting to my DH that his toilet was overflowing and he had to get it taken care of "NOW", I rushed back down and started putting buckets out and grabbing the wet vacuum.

What a mess! It turned out that the toilet wasn't overflowing, the tank had cracked. DH had to turn off the water (much easier to write than to actually turn those old valves). We vacuumed the floors and carpets and as I finally fell back asleep around 1:30 am, he was still making vacuuming noises. Final tally...one broken toilet, soaked carpet in my hallway and in my bedroom and water on the floor in my own bathroom. If I hadn't awakened it would have been MUCH worse. As it is, I allowed myself to sleep until 4am and to skip my run this morning because I needed more than two hours of sleep. I guess it's time to call a plumber...*sigh*.

Fires and Floods and Writing, Oh My!

My post today was going to be very mild, concentrating on the fact that I have the day off and four stories awaiting my attention. But my youth is under attack. OK, I know that sounds rather strange, but it almost seems as though Colorado is burning up. There are fires on the eastern slope near Fort Collins, where I went to school. There is one up the canyon near Boulder where my ex-fiancee, Seth, grew up and a city/town that holds many special memories for me throughout my youth. There is a huge blaze near Colorado Springs/Manitou Springs. That one has grown so quickly and become so dangerous that tens of thousands of people have been evacuated and the Air Force Academy has been closed and evacuated. It's frightening. The fire dangers are one major reason why I have stayed in Minnesota instead of moving back to Colorado or New Mexico. I don't recall them being this bad when I grew up in the area, so I'm wondering about what changed to cause wildfires to be such a major thing over the past ten years or so.

The background in this picture of the Air Force Academy chapel is sunset, but pictures taken now might show the deadly orange of flames on the horizon instead.

And, in the southeast we've got rain. A LOT of rain, the result of the passage of Debbie (hurricane or tropical storm depending on wind speed). More than 30 inches (76.2 cm)of rain in just a few days in some areas. That much rain in that short of a time means vast flooding and intense damage to life and property. My heart goes out to them.

Hurricane Debbie also spawned a number of tornadoes including this one.

So, that's our latest disasters in this country. Somehow having all of those things happening makes my computer issues seem so minor in comparison. I'll go to an early breakfast with Meghan and her delightful young son, and then a few errands ending up with as much writing as I can fit in. I want my AinA complete by the end of the day, and I also want a start on at least one of the four stories I have waiting in the wings. It's going to be hot today and I'll be sweating in the computer room, but I need to get in gear....